Rainbows have to fin for themselves.

• Author: Gray, Tim
• Position: Tar Heel Tattler - National Park Service to bring back brook trout in Smoky Mountains - Brief Article

Brook trout survive only in cold, clean water. For millions of years, the Appalachian mountains provided ideal habitat. But at the turn of the 20th century, much of the North Carolina highlands were logged. Sediment killed off many of the brook trout, and timber companies started stocking streams with hardier rainbow trout.

Now the National Park Service has decided it needs to bring back the brookies -- by killing off the rainbows. "Our enabling legislation says we're to protect and preserve naturally functioning ecosystems, leave them unspoiled for present and future generations," says Steve Moore, the park's head fish biologist.

The Park Service hasn't always seen its mission that way. From the park's founding in 1934 until 1974, it was happy to continue what the timber companies had started, stocking both rainbow and brook trout. "Man played Johnny Applefish," Moore says. "When you start mixing these species, the nonnative typically outcompetes the native. Out West, they stocked brooks where cutthroat exist, and the brookies outcompete the...